5 1 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ures make but gives to their well-built, slender, elastic forms, with 

 their graceful bearing, an appearance like that of bronze statues, 

 especially when they are lighted up by the sun. The eyes of the 

 Nubians at Halle were, without exception, dark brown, with a beam- 

 ing glance, the whites mottled with yellow or brown. They all wore 

 their lusterless black hair after the fashion common everywhere in the 

 Bedsha, with the top hair done up over the head in the form of a 

 pillow, the rest of the hair twisted into loose tufts hanging downward 

 over the ears, and gathered at the bottom into broad curls. They all 

 had a growth of beard, not very thick in any of them, but much 

 stronger than it is generally supposed that ^hey have, and much like 

 that of the south Arabians. Little or no hair grew on other parts of 

 the body, except that they had some strong black hairs below the knees. 

 Their height varied from five feet three and three quarter inches, to 

 five feet ten and three quarter inches, the girth of their calves from 

 eleven and one half inches to fourteen and one quarter inches, giv- 

 ing an average height of five feet six inches, and an average measure- 

 ment of nearly twelve and three quarter inches around the calf. The 

 form of their skulls fixed their place among the mesocephalic races, 

 and, with the broad facial index of seventy degrees and a small per 

 cent., gave to the face the shape of a "well-formed oval of moderate 

 breadth." The head rested on a moderately short, strong neck, and 

 the muscular development of the neck, breast, and arms was very 

 fine. Except in the palms of their hands and the soles of their feet, 

 they appeared to be deeply colored, especially in the covered parts of 

 the body ; but the brown in the face was a little more inclined to a 

 bronze color. The membranous skin in the corners of the eyes and 

 on the lips participated in this coloration, and this made the splendid- 

 ly preserved teeth appear all of a brighter white. The ring-finger 

 in all extended beyond the forefinger, and the great-toe was shorter 

 than the second toe. Their mother-tongue was the ancient Bedanie, 

 the Bedsha language, but they also spoke Arabic. Their senses of 

 hearing, smell, and sight were delicate and sharp. No trace of color- 

 blindness could be found among them. They distinguished with ease 

 fifteen colors, several of which were very nearly related, but had no 

 particular terms for yellow, or to distinguish between blue and green. 

 This fact contradicts the theory that the absence of a particular name 

 for a color indicates a destitution of the faculty of recognizing it 

 among other colors. For colors for which they had no specific name 

 they used the word soldi colored. 



In a like manner, says Kirchhoff, the Djalin in adopting the Arabic 

 language use the Arabic word achder (green) also for blue, and the 

 written Arabic assek, blue, more in the sense of black and brown. This 

 may throw some light on the meaning of Bahr-el- Assek, which we 

 translate Blue Nile, after the meaning of the written Arabic word, 

 when it might be better to follow the local meaning, and call it dark 



